When it comes to online searches , Google plays a central role. With an average of 6.3 million searches per second , the platform is not just a search engine, but a tool of significant influence, especially when we count Google and featured snippets.
After all, each result displayed at the top of searches can direct perception and shape opinions, something that becomes especially critical when considering that many users rarely go beyond the first options presented.
Recent studies show that Google's algorithms not only reflect information, but in many cases replicate and reinforce existing biases. This phenomenon is even more evident in featured snippets, which are highlighted excerpts that appear at the top of search pages and that, in a way, serve as quick answers to users' questions.
These “quick answers,” however, can provide contradictory information depending on how the question is phrased. For example, similar questions with different terms like “relationship between coffee and hypertension” and “coffee does not cause hypertension” can return conflicting answers from the same article. Read on to find out more!
How Google and featured snippets influence what we see
Featured snippets are designed to provide an immediate and instagram data accessible answer to the user, but the way these answers are generated can be problematic.
According to digital marketing director Sarah Presch , Google prioritizes what it deems relevant to the user based on search intent , but not necessarily based on the accuracy or full context of the information. This approach feeds what she calls “a bias machine,” as Google extracts parts of a text based on the searcher’s expectation, rather than providing a balanced view of the topic.
This practice of fragmenting data has a direct impact on the quality of information that reaches the end user. In tests, for example, a search for “the fairness of the UK tax system” with the word “fair” in the context produced a snippet highlighting the opinion of a Conservative politician defending the fairness of the system.